This week it was my privilege to be interviewed on the Lendio.com podcast. The topic was direct response marketing in today’s online world with regard to what works, how to know, and the role that intuition plays.

The interviewer was longtime friend, associate and former RESPONSE Agency Creative Director Ty Kiisel. Early in the interview, I got a kick out of how he cleaned up a well-known expression about opinions. It shouldn’t have been surprising, then, that the interview’s end fell to the cutting room floor. That was the part where, switching gears, we spent a few minutes on my new book, co-written with Joanne Hanks, “It’s Not About the Sex” My Ass: Confessions of an Ex-Mormon Ex-Polygamist Ex-Wife. It’s a funny but disturbing, and, I think, important inside look. Lendio included links on the podcast page, however, which I appreciate.

How not to thank Robert Redford forhelping your state’s brand in a big way

Every year since 1978, the Sundance Film Festival has brought prestige, lots of positive press coverage, and oodles upon oodles of dollars to Utah.

Now the Sutherland Institute, a Utah organization that refers to itself, not without unintended irony, as a “think tank,” has taken a stand against the festival. Quoth its spokesperson: “Given the amount of sexual promiscuity that Sundance Film Festival regularly brings to Utah, it seems similarly indecent that Utah’s major economic development agencies basically endorsed the event.” (Click here for The Salt Lake Tribune story.)

The folks at the Sutherland Institute should get out more.

Years ago, Sutherland approached the RESPONSE Agency for help with direct mail fundraising. The more I listened, the more their executive director and

Celebration of hedonism? The Sutherland Institute should get out more.

Director and actor Robert Redford could have located the Sundance Film Festival anywhere. Lucky for Utah, Redford fell in love with the state’s landscapes during the filming of *Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.* Having lived here 36 years myself, I can hardly blame him. Witness this pic (unretouched) of Cedar Breaks, in Southern Utah, which I took with my iPhone.

the organization troubled me. They seemed the antithesis of fairness, human rights and, for that matter, common sense. I told them we could not in good conscience take them on as a client.

Their subsequent behaviors and public statements repeatedly validated removing our hat from their ring. Their statements about Sundance, though most recent, are by no means the most damning example.

In a much earlier incarnation of this blog, I wrote of the encounter. I did not cite the half of my concerns. (Nor do I see any need to do so now.) It sufficed me to say, “This was not the first time that I walked away from a client or prospective client. But it is the only time that I have left thinking, ‘I hope they fail.’” (Click here for the post.)

Note to the rest of the world: Not everyone in Utah thinks like the Sutherland Institute seems to believe we should.

It all started with the dentist’s direct mail. As you might expect, it was laden with photos of beautiful people showcasing perfect smiles. Yet something was missing. Namely, people who weren’t Caucasian. Last time I looked around, much less checked U.S. Census Bureau data, I found that non-Caucasians account for more than a third of our nation’s population. Moreover, to the best of my knowledge, they all grow teeth. But since that was just one direct mail piece, I decided upon an exercise. I piled all of the past few days’ worth of direct mail, most of it from national advertisers, on my desk. Then I counted the photos and illustrations with people in them. In the final tally, 89 percent showed white people only, six percent showed non-whites only, and five percent showed both. Further indulging my gluttony for punishment, I grabbed two mass-circulation magazines and counted anew. In one, a news magazine, 71 percent of ad photos with people in them showed whites, seven percent showed non-whites, and 22 percent showed both. The other, a general interest magazine, was less encouraging. In every ad with a photo of people, the people were white. Period.Purely from a marketing standpoint, an advertiser who depicts customers of just one race risks losing sales, since those who are excluded may fail to identify with the ads, or even take offense. But from a human standpoint, the concern runs deeper. While the human ability to spot small differences proves useful for mushroomers who wish to avoid poisoning themselves and for children who need to keep family members straight from strangers, it proves harmful when societies needlessly separate into “us” and “them.” Needlessly is no exaggeration. Decades after the hippies sang about filling the world with love, buying it a Coke and treating one another as brothers and sisters, science has borne out the “brothers and sisters” part. Evidence from mitochondrial DNA shows that any two people from any two points on the globe share not just ancestors, but lots of them. And that on average there are more genetic differences between members of the same race than between races themselves. Advertising that is more inclusive will appeal to more people. Better and beyond that, advertisers have a powerful opportunity to reinforce the fact that humankind really is one vast family. Let’s not waste the opportunity. I doubt that the dentist intended any slight. Everyone could do with the occasional reminder. We hope this one serves.

Good for Humankind, Good for SalesI have reminded more than one creative director to be inclusive when writing copy and choosing images. I readily admit that my personal motivation has less to do with marketing and more to do with a social conscience. But for the more mercenary, I offer the convenient fact that inclusiveness is good for sales.

You sell more to customers who identify with the people you depict in your advertising. If you depict only whites, you fail to connect with more than one-third of the population of the United States, soon to be half, given current trends. That’s over 100 million, soon to be 150 million, potential customers.

Hue and facial features aside, it pays to remember that well over 150 million wallet-bearing humans are not male, over 12 million are not straight (and many times that number are their relatives or friends), over 150 million are not in political agreement with you, and over 60 million consider themselves “non religious.”

Review your marketing. See if you’re leaving anyone out or slighting anyone. Taking care to be inclusive offers you increased sales. Better yet, it offers you an opportunity to help spread the scientifically established—and socially crucial—message that we are, after all, one vast family.—Steve Cuno

Your brand is not what you claim. It is what you do.

You probably heard about the government bailout of AIG in 2008. What you may not have heard about is that, around that same time, AIG hastily killed its recently launched branding campaign, “The strength to be there.”

Credulity stretches to imagine that no one, no one who had a part in approving the campaign knew that the claim was bogus. A big ad budget doesn’t make an empty claim true. Your brand is not what you claim. It is what you do.

Remember these guys?

And now AIG, which by all rights should have gone and deserved to go bankrupt, is threatening a lawsuit against the U.S. Government, which spared it that fate. Why? Because the government’s terms were “too severe.”

Your brand is not what you claim. It is what you do. Never mind what AIG claims these days. I don’t like what AIG does.

This morning an AIG insurance offer arrived in my inbox. And since my brand is not what I claim but what I do, what I did was gleefully consign AIG’s email to JUNK.

iPad Mini spot uses visual medium well

This has always been important, but today it is more so because we live in a world of remotes with mute buttons, which let people kill the sound during broadcast commercial breaks, and online spots on computers and other devices, where people kill the sound until the spot ends so they can enjoy the content they were clicking to in the first place.

This Apple iPad Mini spot pulls off with aplomb telling the story visually. Sure, the sound vastly improves the effect, but even with the sound off you can see what’s going on and instantly discern the product benefit.

I dunno about you, but this spot brought a lump to my throat. I suppose that grandparenthood will do that to you.

A Bit of Snark from the“Those Who Can / Those Who Teach” Department

I love the University of Utah. Honest. I’m an alum. Class of ’79. If you have a chance to enroll at the U of U, by all means do.

That said, I cannot resist a snarky chuckle each time I receive an email seeking to interest me in the U’s “Integrated Marketing Communication Certificate Program.” That’s it on the right. I challenge you to wade through the text. Perhaps before offering to make me into a better marketing communicator, these folks should attend a seminar on copy writing. I just happen to teach one.